Man pleads guilty in college student’s death

SPRINGFIELD, Ill.  A man pleaded guilty Friday to killing a college student whose disappearance prompted a nationwide search last year before her body was found in a burned-out Mississippi chicken house.

Maurice Wallace, whose courtroom appearances have been marked with bizarre behavior, pleaded guilty to all counts against him in the slaying of Olamide Adeyooye and in an escape attempt in which prosecutors say he tried to kill a jail guard.

When the judge asked him whether he understood that his plea would keep him behind bars for life, Wallace replied, "Yeah, can't wait."

His attorney noted that the plea agreement was not a product of negotiations but "an embodiment of our client's wishes." Wallace, 28, was unwilling to have any of the charges against him dropped and agreed that the murder was brutal and heinous.

Wallace lived on the same block as Adeyooye, a 21-year-old Illinois State University student and a native of Nigeria who moved to suburban Chicago when she was 8.

Prosecutors say Wallace killed Adeyooye in her apartment in October, then dumped her body in her car and drove away. He was arrested in Atlanta on unrelated charges a day before her body was found and was later connected to the crime; her car keys were found in a rental car Wallace had at the time.